THE LAVENDER WAY

Life 4: this is life 4. We gave up almost everything, started drawing a pension or two prematurely and decamped to Crete. The years of endeavour in IT now pay for my daily cigarettes and coffes and a few other little necessities.

We live a frugal life in the midst of an agricultural valley. Our house is in an olive grove. I write (I published my first book in 2005) and Gill farms lavender in our back fields. We have dogs - two Irish terriers.

We eat simply: homecooked peasant food from local produce. Seasonal foods are the norm. Gill has become a great cook. Our trees provide enough virgin olive oil to supply us year round. The dogs eat anything left over though there is precious little of that.

We live now on the land. In touch with the weather, the seasons, the very sod itself. We keep ourselves to ourselves and yet we have many local friends. They are happy that we do what we want to do. They are happy that we are happy. Many of them came to our wedding in 2006.

We live a remarkably healthy life with lots of exercise - no silly faddish fitness regimes, just simple physical work like chopping logs and tilling fields. We spend most of the daylight hours in the fresh air and live as green a lifestyle as we can.

We are happy and healthy. We are never bored and each new day is a joy. We made the right move.